C84: Living String
7/2/26
I have been putting out a few longer chapters recently so ive struggled to keep up again. We also have the preclimax of the base game (aka mergo) finishing up, so I want to get all that done and some more of the dlc finished, maybe even the upper cathedral ward. so ill be extending my 'break' to stock up on more chapters, if your in my discord, you'll be seeing messages of my 'progress' regarding this book and one other ive been keeping off the books. hehe, books. but max would be one month, aka august second but I shouldnt need to reach that far for the necessary emotional value im looking for.
ill be giving weekly notices on here which ill delete them all once I start reposting again.Though honestly, I would hope to be able to complete the rest of bloodborne in this time. fingers crossed im motivated.
oh right, the 7th of July is my dogs birthday, he is turning 14 and im worried for him. Give him some spiritual kisses and nose boops, if you can, to keep him healthy.
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"Sounds like it's time for part 2. " I rush into the air, trying to find his exact position as Chaos eclipse works by creating big bubbles around targets.
These bubbles are roughly 100 feet wide in terms of circumference. They are set up like this to have a higher chance of each bubble affecting the clones. Originally they were small bubbles centered on the clones themselves, roughly 5 ft radi. As they moved out of my sensing range, I had to switch it up into larger bubbles to ensure they kept being affected by the chaos Proc'.
Now I can only generally sense where the bubbles themselves are, so until I get closer, I could not properly tell where the original was. Based on the scream from earlier, he is unlikely to make any movements which does work for me as I do spot him near a patch of heavy darkness.
As such, I could just end him here and now, easy peasy but I made a promise. An arm for an arm, a brain for a lamp. He will pay and he will suffer.
After a brisk walk, I find myself at the edge of the bubble. It's actually in an isolated room with the gate locked down, keeping him trapped except for a single entrance from the ceiling. I shrink the bubble back down but only to cover this specific room.
I drop down and get a quick flicker in my memory where this is the final room you fight Nicolash in. I shake my head at this memory as I feel like there is some sentimental value in this room. Or perhaps some sort of consistent law of the world but I'm not strong enough to properly gauge that when I'm still struggling with darkness comprehension.
I gaze down at Nicolash who appears to be unconscious on the floor. I don't like it. I don't believe him to be real. I expand the bubble once more in case I missed something before stepping away and super sonic yeeting a pebble into the lying Nicolash. The impact connects and his body shoots into the opposite wall where chaos procs' again since external actions count as movement too.
I don't see the health bar drop at all. I stomp my foot.
It's not the real Nicolash. I was bamboozled.
"EHEHEHEHEHE, Feeling lost dear hunter? Your misery is only starting." The distant voice calls out. Strangely enough, I find that a trace of my poison gauge has started rising.
I examine my surroundings but don't find anything that could be poisonous. I depart from this box, or try to as the ceiling entrance is suddenly closed by a pillar of metal and stone slams down over it. My poison gauge is rising faster now.
I frown as I examine my body to see if I was somehow infected by something that had gotten past my astral cloak and chaos barrier but nothing there. I then activate Astral Breathing which uses my mana to generate air for me to breathe and that does stop the gauge after a few moments. It starts ticking back down.
"Poison Air, I didn't realize that it could get past my barriers. Not bad for the ugly copy of Sirius Black. I then float back up to the top pillar as I activate my Life Creator (sealed) to its full potential as I analyze the material, it's gaps which I then abuse with various elemental mixtures to blast them apart before allowing myself to be freed after a few minutes.
I then restart my extensive sensing before being forced to collapse the Chaos Eclipse, name pending, as I realize that he isn't being touched by my mana at all. He must have somehow escaped the entire zone.
[Boss has escaped]
"...."
"FUCK YOU MEAN THAT BITCH RAN!??" I curse as I do notice that his health bar just disappears. I begin smacking the various rooms apart until only ruins exist. I do find the old iron key as well as another Kin coldblood (10) in one of the side rooms with a magic mirror that I store them all away, since their valuable magic tools if I can figure out how they work.
I find that due to Nicolash running like a bitch, the bridge that originally showed up leading to the boss arena, rises up so now I could legally cross the venue.
Finding myself outside, I have stairs on my left which I take up to find a few more crow dogs (crows with dog heads), I take them out and get a Kin coldblood (11).
With some blood on my hands now, I get a chance to calm down and realize that my comprehension of darkness rose by 6% which means it's now at 13%. Wowee. I suck at this. I'm much more comfortable with chaos. I guess I'll just level that up since my brain, even before finding out about the nugget, was drained by my job. It sucked.
I use another few million skill points in the skill refinery to upgrade chaos step as even the newly made skill, Chaos Eclipse, had my comp of chaos also rise a sexy 3%. That's my own effort including the original levels I was able to get into chaos steps back before the skill refinery. I'm quite proud of it, no matter how little, it's progress. But with the new influx of 'xp' into the skill. It reaches T5 after quite a while and that shoots my comprehension up a ton as my brain receives a direct funnel of a crap ton of information.
Various patterns, runes, events, chemical reactions, wondrously cataclysmic reactions of dozens of natural, magical and Eldritch elements.
After a half hour, I finally get up as I extend my hand and witness an orb of purple gather on my hand. My senses reveal the collaboration of a magical core with runic sigils wrapping around it, which itself is protected by a morphing cloud of purple gas.
I reach the top of the steps where I spot another cage that can take me down to where I saw a small gap in the previous cage. Yet the cage door is stuck open which means there is a possibility of jumping out something. My senses don't reach far enough but it should be somewhere along the halfway point of the lifts pathing. Yet before I go down to activate the lift. I have to do something about the orb in my hand.
I've already formed it, it's there in my hand. Why would I not use my newly understood skill?
"No, I should come up with a new name for it first. Not something simple like chaos orb, too basic." I murmur to myself before spotting a group of three reverse KKK members walking to some stairs away from me.
I shrug before tossing it out. It strikes the first like a rocket, sending them flying forward into the stairs. Around that one member of the illuminati, spikes of various elements and explosions occur. This takes out one of the three while the other was knocked back.
As for the one struck directly, it got a chaos barrier, yet their suffering is even worse with the orb itself moving to the center of this shmucks chest, veins begin to spread out and corrupt its nerves, taking it over like a parasite.
The enemy soon stands up, seemingly unharmed. As it turns around, I notice a purple flow of light leaking from it's eyes like gassy wisps. As for the orb on its chest…
it morphed into an Eye.
"Hmm, yes, Chaos corruption or Chaorruption for short. Very nice. Very useful too" I bear witness to this first corrupted enemy bumrush the other that was knocked down and spread the corruption to their unconscious body before spreading it further to the third that was nearly torn apart. It gains new limbs in the form of tentacles that help it walk and fight again before the three bow to me and head up the stairs to fight whatever lies ahead.
(A/N: I pronounce it as Kay-O-rruption. Your welcome to make your own pronunciation if you wish)
"And not a single tick to my pet slots too. I guess I found a legal loophole…or not" I comment before checking my status and finding that Curious George got another secret level up, making it VI with the external +1 for a total of 60% retained stats whenever I enter out of bounds areas.
"Hmm, yea, I think I'll call that orb the Chaos Atom with it having the rotating 'electrons'. Yea that sounds fun. The 105th element on the periodic table of elements. Shitium, the worst element because it doesnt just kill you and mutilate your corpse, it makes you a zombie that rapidly spreads to others. Far higher danger than any radioactive element that only explodes and leaves behind the closest thing to a poison cloud in a massive region.
With my business complete, I finally take the lift down and I spot the very obvious path to go forward with this little venture. Reaching the bottom, I leisurely go back up.
A simple dash forward and I'm already inside the side path. Looking around, I only see the way forward which branches to the left into 3 exits which all lead to the same place. A long hallway with multiple strange bumpous stone wall scattered around, they are roughly all head height. Some are shorter while others are miniscully taller, yet the problem here is that due to multiple physique changes, my height is now 7'6", meaning im much taller than these walls. Looking over them easily, I can see the same dreadchilling creature that my wind senses are warning me about.
Winter Lantern.
"Fuck, why are they here too." I curse as my senses tell me there are multiple of them here too. Four to be exact, but they are at least evenly spread out.
I crouch down as I begin making my way through, Once a wandering winter lantern steps into a portion of Shadows, I cloak it in said shadows, ensuring that it wouldn't be able to release and frenzy light to touch me.
Click
I activate the trick state of my saw cleaver to ensure that when I hit, there is extra distance in case that a ray somehow could escape where I hit from. In addition, Lunar Moon rises up again for that same insurance policy.
BANG
I swing the saw cleaver with precise movement and directly split the winter lantern in half before the shadow cloak compresses itself around the upper half and shadow ports it off the edge of the bridge path here.
I continue forward but the first half of the bridge doesnt have much else except a single pickup halfway through that is a set of bullets for me to store away.
The second half is far more dangerous as the remaining lanterns are scattered here. The first is just on the other half of the bridge while the second is halfway through and the last is near the very end. I follow through on the same plan with the shadow cloak on them which restricts their movement as well as the frenzy light.
I approach the first and kill it which drops a gemstone which I pocket before approaching the other two, planning to take them out too until a ball of light spawns them both and multiplies around me too.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAH" BOOM
A horrifying laugh echoes around as the orbs explode all around. I dashed to get out of the way and I can sense that the lanterns were also freed as their bulbous heads shine.
BOOM SPLURT cough cough
Unfortunately to dodge another explosion from the ambushing bitch that is Nicolash, I step into multiple rays of frenzy which come from two different lanterns that slowly begin to gather around me. I didn't have enough time to chug down a sedative before my frenzy maxes out and blood shoots out from all my pores, my eyes, nose and mouth like vomit.
I finally shadow port back to the halfway point and cough to expel the remaining blood in my mouth. I then look up and find Nico-shit gloating mid air.
He sends down more orbs to disrupt me as the lanterns continue their pathing to me even though they cant see me. Perhaps they are guided by the explosions or Nicolash himself is connecting to them to guide towards me.
Regardless, I am forced to retreat further away before I spawn a chaos atom in my hand and release it to the midpoint I just left behind.
WOOM
At the time that the 'atom' arrives at the tall pillar, a lantern steps into it's path. The one it comes in contact with is covered in a barrier while the other is blasted away with wind and a thunderous blast which sends it flying back to the other side. The chaos corruption spreads on the first lantern as the signature eye appears on it's chest. The previous eyeball laden head now is coated in purple veins as it turns towards Nicolash before releasing its light.
"GAAAAAAAGHHHH" Nicolash doesnt expect the frenzy rays as unlike me, he cant see them so he explodes due to the frenzy gauge which drops him a big chunk of health. He disappears along with his health bar as he retreats like the little bitch he is.
The lantern then turns around, grabbing it's buddy which only just got up and shining it's head. They both explode in frenzy but the one I corrupted, continues to grab the other and have it's corruption spread to the other until they both enter my service.
With the threats gone, I collect the other random set of bullets here on the far side of the bridge before taking some steps down and finding not only a hole in the floor on my left but also a lever further ahead in an opening on the wall.
I approach it and gaze out to see a second bridge linked to a circular dome made up of multiple layers of stone where I can barely make out that something is suspended inside the dome by changing connecting to it from the ceiling above. I estimate that they are connected to the lever before me.
I stand beside the lever, my hand falls to rest on the lever as I pass through memory land once more, remembering that somehow, I had access to the other side of the bridge and would use sedatives to stay alive as I ran through, collecting all the items but never sure on how to kill the thing granting frenzy.
{"Mercy"} a call reaches out to me by psychic threads, sounding as if a chaotic gathering of voices but one rises up higher than the others, that of an old man.
I lift my guard up as I set up my magical defenses which I quickly sense easily block these threads. I lower my defenses again as I reach out to said threads as I speak in my head to hopefully provide a counter reply.
{"Why should I?"} I ask in return as I identify the source of these threads that I could only ever notice due to my magical senses.
{"I..I.I.I.I.IIII serve} It seems to struggle with more than one word sentence with how much it stuttered just to refer to itself.
I reach out to the threads again as I make my demand clear. {"I require the Living String. Do you have it?"}
{"Y-Y-Y-Y-Y-Yes.} {M-M-M-M-M-MY Heart"}
The creature reveals which in turn makes the previously dull flow of energy in my own heart rise back up in desire. The urge to kill this 'monstrosity' reaches an all time high but I don't let these emotions rule me as I'm about to ask for it but it beats me to it by 'talking' first.
"{I-I-I-I-I-I G-G-G-G-Give}{S-S-S-S-S-S-S-stand here}"
My senses spot a location next to the circular structure where the psychic threads gather. I shrug as I drop down the hole and kill the giant spider with bald heads similar to patches before dropping down another hall for a bigger room with a few more of these spiders and another winter lantern. But this one was easier to take out as the whole area was much darker.
It dies to shadow spikes and then I collect the choir bell from within the chest it was guarding before stepping outside. The brain does not shine, I do not get the frenzy gauge as loot magnet activates and with it's upgraded potential, gathers everything in the general vicinity.
I get multiple Great One's wisdom and then a single madman's knowledge. You mean one of these retarded schmucks was just a random dude granted ethereal knowledge and then died like a bitch? Whatever, sucks to be him, probably was just using a toilet nearby and then boom, nightmare realm and his head expanded to the size of a watermelon before he got 'Troned'[1].
Oh, I also get a blood rock, that's very essential. Now I just need to figure out how to duplicate it and then I can upgrade all my gear to its full potential, at least from a non magical state.
Now comes the hard part, trusting a giant brain with eyes randomly spread out over its body to give me a single vital ingredient for a single chalice dungeon which, I, for some reason am obsessed with.
I step into the 'light' of psychic threads. I reach out for a bundle and talk to it. "Im here, give me the living string now."
I see the brain squirm and jiggle before a crevice opens up in the lower middle of its something-lobe. A jar with a thread of something sticking out like a small root. Bent into a circle where it stops. I almost get the impression that some cutie messengers are sticking out of the red liquid in the cup.
I reach for cup and string when suddenly im blasted with rays of frenzy that cause me to bleed out everywhere. Nicolash's laughter soon follows. I understood quickly as the string is retracted back into the brain of Mensis, I fell into a trap. I trusted a thing, a so called elder god, a man made god who only serves one purpose. And that purpose is to die to me, at this very moment.
I use my shadows to pull the lever which causes the brain to drop a bit before it's weight shatters the chains and it goes plummeting down.
Unfortunately, I do not spot Nicolash anywhere, I could only assume that he was watching from a distance, like the rat he was.
Cough cough
For now, I expel the remaining chunks of blood from my body which the frenzy had shattered. I'm actually surprised I hadn't died to this whole thing since I was hit with frenzy not too long ago. I look at my status and find that my health is low but instead it's my blood echoes which I know I hadnt spend all of, were at half it's original value. That is hundreds of millions gone, randomly at that.
Did the system steal it from me, or something else that was here? For now, I use the bold hunters mark to return to my last lamp and then return to the dream to rest and upgrade my gear since it feels like I might not be able to later down the line.
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Word Count = 3395
[1]: Here is a fun fact for the day- So there is a movie called Tron, in it, there is a scene of some announcer getting his head exploded but it was literally just a watermelon being blown up.
discord channel still has the next chapter preview like usual: https://discord.gg/rE6gtg28XH
Patreon.com/Xanok to find me.